That's the winning name in a contest by the North Carolina Department of Transportation to come up with a cute title for a three-year reconstruction of Interstate 40/440 — a project that promises to be anything but cute for motorists.

NCDOT announced the winner Wednesday morning. While many people submitted "Crawleigh," Grant Tew was the first to do so and now has official "bragging rights" to the moniker that will be used in all future references to the $168 million project. It will even be the name on the project's website.

"I was born and raised around the Triangle area," Tew said. "I think I've crawled through enough traffic snarls to know what one looks like. So Crawleigh seemed like a good name."

NCDOT officials came up with the contest last month to give the project a catchy name like Boston's Big Dig or Carmageddon in Los Angeles. Submissions came from more than 350 residents, and officials chose five finalists to put up for a public vote online.

The names that made the final cut were: Carmuda Triangle, Crawleigh, South-Wake Remake, Southern Discomfort and Wake-Over.

In the end, Crawleigh won handily, securing 2,360 of 4,752 votes.

The rebuild of 11 miles of I-40/440 – from U.S. Highway 1 in Cary to U.S. Highway 64/264 in Raleigh – will begin next spring or summer and last three years.

The project will require lane closures, sometimes leaving only two lanes open.

Officials said the section of highway is 30 years old, and workers need to dig down at least 2 feet to remove and replace concrete and asphalt on the road, shoulders and ramps.

Although they did not make the final five, the following entries earned an honorable mention from NCDOT:

Lane-Sanity

Fortyfication

I-40; Duke-0

Tar Hell

40 Shades of Congestion

Lanes of Pain

Shouldhavebuiltalightrailinstead

Lordylordygetmeoffforty

Numb Buns

Constructipation – Waiting for traffic to get moving again

Y’all Crawl

Credits

Web Editor

Angie Basiouny

Copyright 2012 by Capitol Broadcasting Company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

leeloo67Aug 23, 2012

How old is the winner? If he is older than 40 he'd have also said "I remember a time when driving in Raleigh was enjoyable." Anyone remember Glenwood Ave. in the 70s? An empty multi-lane road....

North Carolina HomeAug 22, 2012

If the polls are correct (and I believe they are), DOT has a large number of very wary and uncertain employees. If we are fortunate enough to elect Pat McCrory as governor, he will decide which DOT projects get funding and I don't believe I440 in Raleigh is at the top of the list. The DOT will receive a thorough makeover and it's long past due.

lollyAug 22, 2012

"unless you have a degree in civil engineering, are a licensed professional civil engineer, and have experience with interstate roadway design, your input means nothing here. This is being done for a reason. A good reason at that."

pssssst - guess where your money is coming from?! It starts with a T and ends with an r - it is called taxpayers. And this is going to be a huge shocker to you, but we have input because we paid for the ( pitiful) structures. This will rock your world, because DOT is known for being just such an insular, band-of-brothers group as your post perfectly exemplifies; but we do matter because we are paying DOT's salaries.

Have a nice day, now, ya hear?

lollyAug 22, 2012

"you need to be a licenced engineer to determine that the following were less-than-stellar ideas brought to us by NCDOT?"

I agree with NeverSurrender.

I will also note that, after years of reading and posting to wral, you can count on the DOT to cover the comments sections with defensive posts. After all, if you cannot handle the work, you can try to handle the social media. Wish they were half as good at fixing roads, as they are at fixing social media.

Lone Voice in the WildernessAug 22, 2012

I also agree with m0nky. There are a lot of opini, uh, whining, but very little in the way of useful or substantial input.

I-40 and I-95 still go two ways: so if you would rather move to a city that has perfect roads and effortless maintenance of them, you can always leave.

My guess is that the same people who are complaining about the Interstate system are the same ones who want to starve the government & not pay a penny more in tax and yet still expect the DOT to keep up with all the demand.

And people who think that Raleigh traffic is bad obviously haven't seen what really bad traffic even is.

Just sayin'…

starvingdogAug 22, 2012

Hooray for NC98 to get from the East to West of Rolly-wood!

lec02572Aug 22, 2012

I think they got that right with the way traffic is in and around Raleigh "Crawl."

NeverSurrenderAug 22, 2012

"Agree with m0nky. Unless you are licensed engineer (which I am) and have experience in roads (which I don't), you really don't have an expert opinion to contribute. I will defer to the civil engineers on this and just say nothing lasts forever."

Soooo...you need to be a licenced engineer to determine that the following were less-than-stellar ideas brought to us by NCDOT?

1. Four lanes of I-40 collapsing to two lanes in both directions from US-1/US-64 to Wade Avenue resulting in huge gridlock?

2. Reducing a two lane exit onto I-40 west from I-540 to one lane?

3. Not expanding capacity and using other innovative features such as HOV lanes, express lanes (i.e. no exits from A to B), metered on-ramps like I-494 in Minneapolis, etc. whilst you're out there digging up I-40 for Crawleigh anyway?

4. Not relying on 20-year old capacity projects that led to cratering I-795?

5. Not supervising contractor who screwed up I-40 for a costly re-do at our expense?

SaveEnergyManAug 22, 2012

Agree with m0nky. Unless you are licensed engineer (which I am) and have experience in roads (which I don't), you really don't have an expert opinion to contribute. I will defer to the civil engineers on this and just say nothing lasts forever.

zacksmillAug 22, 2012

"Crawleigh"...awww that's so cute. Ain't it nice the incompetent NCDOT can joke about how they cause traffic to crawl along I-440 even after the construction is over?